This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here . The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. Name: Quirky Quick Pitch: Quirky is a social product development company founded in June 2009 by 23-year-old entrepreneur Ben Kaufman. Genius Idea: At its core, Quirky builds consumer products. It sells cable organizers , a modular spatula system , and double-sided USB sticks . It’s how they create and develop their products that really makes them stand out, though. Quirky describes itself as a “social product development company.” It essentially crowdsources product ideas and then places them at the mercy of Quirky’s thousands of users. The community votes on which ones they want to develop and then adds its input on things such as product aesthetics, design, logo, and even its name. The best ideas are then taken by Quirky’s team of engineers and designers and turned into 3D renderings. The next step is the most important one: the product is then placed on pre-sale, where anyone can buy the product. However, Quirky will only sell something if it hits a minimum number of sale commitments (usually under a thousand). Once that number is reached, the product is made and person who submitted the original idea gets a piece of the revenue pie. There are a few things to know before you go off designing tons of products for Quirky. First, it costs $99 to submit an idea. Second, even if your product is selected by the community, it doesn’t mean it will become a major hit. Finally, many products on Quirky still have yet to hit their minimum purchase requirement, and some of the products on sale on the site aren’t cheap. In the end though, we believe that Quirky is a killer tool for both entrepreneurs without the means to bring an idea into production and for geeks looking to buy useful — if not odd — products. The best ideas find their way to the top and are vetted by the community, which brings multiple perspectives and opinions to a product’s development. Quirky was founded by Ben Kaufman, who is the creator of Mophie , the popular iPhone and iPod accessory company, so it has some serious brainpower behind the company. You can learn more about the Quirky process here . Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today . Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest – use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* ( please see website for official rules and guidelines ).” For more technology coverage, follow Mashable Tech on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Facebook , PHP , Twitter Tags: bizspark , Crowdsource , Product Design , Quirky , shopping
Aza Raskin, the creative lead for Firefox, has just posted about a new type of potential phishing attack , dubbed “tabnabbing.” Raskin has a proof-of-concept and an explanation for how this type of attack could work. Tabnabbing operates in reverse of most phishing attacks in that it doesn’t ask users to click on a obfuscated link but instead loads a fake page in one of the open tabs in your browser. Check out this tabnabbing scenario: You have a bunch of open tabs in your web browser, an e-mail page, Facebook, your bank account and maybe a bunch of news sites. While you’re reading your favorite Mashable.com content, the attack is able to hone in on tabs that haven’t been used or aren’t in focus and replace the favicon (the icon in your tab bar) and the title of the tab. When you click on that tab, a fake page is loaded in its place, maybe it is loaded to look like a standard login page. Because you already had this tab open legitimately before, you don’t bother paying any attention to the URL in the address bar and you enter in your login information. You’ve just sent your info to a nefarious third party. Raskin shows off how this works in this video: Pretty scary, right? Raskin details some methods that could make this sort of attack even more insidious, including checking to see if a user is currently logged in or out of a certain site in order to better offer up a believable fake page. How would this attack get on your system to begin with, you might ask? Plugins and add-ons are the most common way that intruders can gain access to your system. Client-side script injections by way of JavaScript, Flash, ActiveX and so on are responsible for many browser attacks. This is just one more reason to always make sure you’re using an up-to-date web browser. The Fix Raskin’s proof of concept is scary, but it isn’t fool proof. This is what you can do to keep yourself safe from these types of attacks: Keep your web browser up-to-date. Also make sure that plugins and extensions are up-to-date and from trusted sources. If you’re a Windows user, make sure you have anti-virus or anti-malware software on your computer Pay attention to the address in your browser’s toolbar, especially when it comes to login pages. It’s easy to get into muscle-memory mode and just assume that a tab is unchanged, but for important user accounts, keep an eye on that location bar. Consider using some sort of password management tool. Raskin points to the Firefox Account Manager as one method of using the browser for your identity manager, but plugins and tools like 1Password are good choices too. Rather than typing in user names and passwords individually, using an identity manager that compares the site you are on against the stored data in its database (making sure the addresses and DNS addresses matchup) will prevent you from entering in information into a false site. As of right now, this is not an attack that is out in the wild — it’s a proof of concept. However, tabnabbing does illustrate some of the ways that users can have information compromised by way of indirect attacks. For more technology coverage, follow Mashable Tech on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: Browsers , phishing , security , tabnabbing
Twitter once again pulled a fast one on app developers when it announced today that third-party ads will be banned from the service. Such behavior tends to leave one’s developer community feeling more than a little alienated , but this isn’t an open source lovefest, after all. This is big business, and it’s apparent that Twitter intends to make sure the most lucrative aspects of that business remain internal. Jason Goldman, Twitter’s product VP, told developers at Chirp that the company was looking increasingly at business and analytics services. “As Twitter gets ready to ramp up promoted tweets,” we wrote at the time, “be aware that the company is fully cognizant of the money-making potential of ad platforms and measurement tools.” In other words, don’t expect the company to give away a potentially lucrative revenue stream. In many ways, this move is reminiscent of the company’s acquisition of Tweetie about a month ago. Then, too, third-party developers and investors who had built startups on top of the Twitter platform were blindsided because Twitter wasn’t transparent about its roadmap. “The problem is that business have been created, received funding and developed over the past year, with the full knowledge of Twitter, and this just undercuts & destroys them,” writes WhatTheTrend analyst Liz Pullen . “This is a policy decision that should have been made over a year ago.” Then again, all’s fair in capitalism, or so we must believe if we’re to build technology on increasingly competitive platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. Developer Reactions Around the Web In a Google group for third-party devs working on Twitter’s APIs, several devs chimed in to express displeasure with the announcement. “This isn’t a surprise,” wrote Moluv director/editor Maurice Wright. “It’s the fact that I’ve been participating in events, developing, networking, and building a team all year AFTER getting affirmations from individuals at Twitter that I had nothing to worry about in building a Twitter advertising platform… I understand the need to tidy up from time to time. But this was more like sand-blasting the living room in order to do some dusting.” “It is clear that Twitter is going to take everything for themselves,” wrote Twitter client Nambu founder Eric Woodward, echoing the sentiments of many developers we’ve spoken with about the issue. “I don’t understand why anyone would continue to develop on Twitter’s platform as anything more than a hobby. First it was us (Twitter clients), and now it is the ad platforms’ turn. Next it will be somebody else.” Some devs wonder why anyone would be surprised at this turn of events. In a Hacker News thread , MySpace engineer-turned-startup founder Cheolho Minale wrote, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. By now we should realize the pattern with Twitter is that any company that adds real value to Twitter, they are more than willing to take the idea, and build a competing service… They fooled us all when they said they just wanted to be the pipe.” A Matter of Trust Developer Adrian Duyzer cautions hackers that, although all technology is dependent on the innovations of others, “We’re all vulnerable to the whims of the people who build the operating systems, the browsers, heck, even the protocols. The important question probably comes down to ability and motive: Can this platform be turned against me, and do those who control it gain some advantage from doing so?” Ultimately, building apps on someone else’s platform requires a certain amount of trust. That trust should be proportional to the effort, funding and expectations one has pumped into one’s app — i.e., if you raise millions of dollars and spend a year working full-time and then some to build a Twitter ad platform, you have to really trust that Twitter isn’t going to undermine your business by releasing an ad platform of its own. But in the land of third-party apps, there are no such guarantees, and where money and corporations are concerned, there should be no such trust. For more technology coverage, follow Mashable Tech on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Facebook , MySpace , Twitter Tags: ads , ban , developers , hacker news , twitter
This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here . The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. Name: moBistro Quick Pitch: Create your own mobile websites that are compatible on 98% of all smartphones with a simple user backend. Genius Idea: moBistro is a service that makes it easy for business owners to create mobile versions of their websites without having to do any coding on their own. Many of the features are aimed at restaurant owners, who often have Flash-based websites that break on most mobile phones. While other sites like MoFuse also offer mobile website creation, moBistro is unique in its restaurant-focused options. Users can easily add in location data, links to external sites like OpenTable, events that can become accessible in a calendar, menus, special offers and more. Everything on your moBistro site is manageable through a control panel that was designed to be easy to use and operate. When it comes time to serve the website, moBistro will automatically redirect mobile phones to the correct version of the site, depending on what capabilities the phone has. You can customize moBistro to fit with your business’s branding and color scheme and you can monitor mobile web traffic from Google Analytics. moBistro doesn’t just create the mobile-friendly version of your website; it hosts it too. That’s good for users who don’t want to have to deal with configuring their web server to serve the mobile version of their sites, however, it does make the product more expensive. While we think the services offered by moBistro are great, we think the pricing — which starts at $19.99 per month — is a bit high for this kind of service. Still, the ability to easily create mobile-friendly content that can work on hundreds of devices without having to do any coding is an idea that should appeal to lots of business owners who are trying to figure out how to best address the mobile web. Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today . Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest – use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* ( please see website for official rules and guidelines ).” Tags: mobile web , mobistro , Web Development
There’s a new Chatroulette spinoff in town: meet ChatVille . It’s a Facebook app that combines the basic video chat elements of Chatroulette with the game mechanics, badges and leveling up of casual games like FarmVille . Just like in Chatroulette , you have the opportunity to get paired up with a total stranger — but since the app can also take advantage of your Facebook social graph, you can also invite specific friends to chat with you as well. Plus, in chatting with either strangers or friends, you have the opportunity to earn badges for specific actions, like taking your first screenshot or getting a “compliment” from another user. The app also features some other extra features like a built-in screenshot function; the screengrabs you take can then be optionally posted on your Facebook wall. Another extra feature quickly turns your webcam into an ad hoc photobooth, with the results also postable to your Facebook wall. Built by the same team that made the popular instant messaging desktop client Digsby, many are already calling ChatVille “Chatroulette done right.” It’s certainly not the first Chatroulette clone we’ve seen , but it is unique for tapping into Facebook as an underlying social platform. Considering it stands to benefit greatly from the built-in virality of encouraging everyone to share their badges and accomplishments within the app, it will be interesting to see if or how fast this spreads as a much less “ awkwardly adult oriented ” version of Chatroulette. Have you had a chance to check out ChatVille yet? If so, what do you think of the app — how does it compare to experiences you may have had on Chatroulette? [via VentureBeat ] For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Digsby , Facebook , Twitter Tags: badges , chatville , digsby , facebook , facebook apps , farmville , game mechanics , games , video chat
Elmo and his Sesame Street friends have already set up shop in Apple’s App Store, but today Bert, Ernie, Big Bird and the rest of the crew now have their own e-bookstore to call home. The Sesame Street e-bookstore is an online collection of 121 character-driven e-books — covering learning subject areas like letters, numbers, counting and colors — offered in standard, audio, interactive and animated formats. Users pay an annual $39.99 subscription fee for unlimited access to all titles. The e-books available include many of the same titles that Sesame Street has published over the past 40 years, but with digital additives. Audio e-books include narration, sound effects and music; interactive titles invite children to participate in the storytelling process; and animated e-books read like movies with full-color animation. The site gives users their own bookshelf, includes tips for parents and boasts simplified navigation for children in Kids Mode. Sesame Street’s digital publishing initiative is an aggressive move that makes its popular titles relevant to today’s web-centric world. Sesame Street has, however made a few puzzling choices; for instance, books are only accessible through the Sesame Street e-book reader, a browser-based application that requires Flash and is thus neither platform-independent nor mobile-friendly. Also, the annual subscription fee model implies that users won’t actually own any of the titles. Still, if parents respond to the e-bookstore the same way they’ve responded to iPhone and iPad versions of Sesame Street content, then this endeavor could prove to be a big success for the educational non-profit. For more technology coverage, follow Mashable Tech on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Facebook , Twitter Tags: ebooks , sesame street
As we noted yesterday, the launch of the new Google Buzz API means that applications like TweetDeck, Seesmic, Plancast and Boxee can now integrate directly with Google Buzz. Seesmic Desktop released its first version with Google Buzz support yesterday and today TweetDeck joins the Google Buzz party. The new version of TweetDeck also adds support for Foursquare , enabling users to view updates, see venue information, check in from a venue and more. Tweetdeck also now supports custom URL shorteners, better video upload and scheduled updates. One of the features we’re most excited about testing out is global filters. Tired of seeing Justin Bieber take over your TweetDeck? Just create a filter to hide any messages that include “Bieber” or “Twieber.” TweetDeck version 0.34 is available for download now or you can update your existing version of TweetDeck to get all the new stuff. Check out the video below for an overview of all the new features. For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: foursquare , google buzz , software , tweetdeck , twitter
This year has seen more location-aware applications than we could have imagined. Everyone from big brands to one-app startups is scrambling to integrate location features right now, and at least one company is doing a lot of business based on that fact. SimpleGeo, a startup that gives developers the ability to add location-based features to their applications, has just announced a new round of funding and a slew of new hires. Having set up shop last fall with a grand total of $1.67 million in seed money, SimpleGeo has now raised $8.14 million in a Series A round from Redpoint Ventures, First Round Capital, Lowercase Capital, the Foundry Group and angel Ravi Narasimhan. As for new staff, Digg’s recent personnel cuts following founder Kevin Rose’s takeover of the CEO role have been this startup’s gain. SimpleGeo has snapped up Jeffrey Kalmikoff, Ian Eure, Paul Lathrop and Nicole Williams, all formerly of Digg. The company also hired Rob Bailey of Yahoo/Lotus Vodka. The year-old company is now 18 employees — and a reported 4,000 developer partners — strong. SimpleGeo’s location-services infrastructure, including a cloud-based storage engine and a geodata marketplace, was formally launched about 6 weeks ago. Altogether, SimpleGeo’s products shave months off development time for location-based services. The marketplace itself is like an “ iTunes for geodata ,” according to co-founder Matt Galligan. Here’s a video demonstrating the kinds of data available: According to the company blog , these new funds and new people will be instrumental in “changing and improving our product, positioning, marketing, etc. over the next few months.” SimpleGeo plans to make “significant improvements” to its API and add some impressive new features. img credit: caveman ] For more business coverage, follow Mashable Business on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Reviews: Digg , Facebook , Twitter , blog Tags: funding , location , simpelgeo
Restaurant recommendation site Urbanspoon is preparing to roll out a new iPad app and subscription service called RezBook , which will allow restaurants to book and manage reservations. Similar to OpenTable and its backend management software, RezBook is designed to replace the paper booking system that many restaurants use with a system that is not only mobile, but also capable of storing customer information, seating requests and more. We spoke with Urbanspoon co-foudner Ethan Lowry about RezBook, Urbanspoon and the iPad. When the iPad was first announced, the team at Urbanspoon immediately saw the device as a perfect extension to its website. While the company released an iPad optimized version of its popular iPhone app last month, Mr. Lowry said that the company immediately had bigger plans in mind for the new Apple tablet. Last November, Seattle-based Urbanspoon did a local roll-out of its reservation service, Rez. The company recently expanded Rez to Los Angeles and has plans to launch in other major cities throughout the next year. Similar to OpenTable, Rez lets customers book tables at restaurants online, within the Urbanspoon mobile apps, or via a widget located on a restaurant’s homepage. Unlike competitor OpenTable, Urbanspoon does not charge for covers (reservations) booked from a restaurant’s own website, only covers booked through the Urbanspoon site or app. However, Rez really only took care of basic reservation management; it was still up to the individual restaurant to manage or integrate Rez with their existing systems. With RezBook, which will be available to restaurants throughout the U.S., the idea is to replace the traditional paper reservation book with an iPad. The iPad offers a few advantages over other electronic systems: It’s a consumer device, which means that using it is more straightforward and often more familiar to staffers than other systems. The price of the hardware itself is relatively inexpensive, especially for its form factor. The iPad 3G offers restaurants good backup if internal WiFi becomes flakey. In addition to monitoring tables and reservations and automatically pulling in online reservations, RezBook allows restaurant workers to store customer information like seating preference, food allergies, important dates, etc. As Mr. Lowry said, “This is what can separate restaurants that have really good relationships with customers from those that don’t.” Every restaurant-goer can appreciate when restaurants remember things about their dining experience. From a pricing perspective, RezBook won’t break the bank. The app itself will be free, and subscriptions to the service will start at $99 per month. In addition to having the iPad app, restaurants will also be able to access reservation data on a web-based back-end, which is useful for managers who might want to check in on things from home. Urbanspoon is already one of my favorite ways to find recommendations for restaurants; with RezBook, it might finally give OpenTable some competition in the online reservation space. As great as OpenTable is, it’s virtually the only major player in the online reservation space, and its pricing model often excludes smaller or mid-size restaurants that could really benefit from a better system. RezBook is currently in testing in Seattle. Restaurants interested in joining the program can contact Urbanspoon through this page . In the coming weeks, the app will be in the App Store. For more mobile coverage, follow Mashable Mobile on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: ipad , ipad apps , opentable , reservations , rezbook , UrbanSpoon
Google has just announced the Chrome Web Store , an open marketplace for web applications, at Google I/O . It’s like the Android App Market but for apps on the web. Like the App Market, developers will be able to sell their apps through the store via Google’s secure payment system. Google is effectively bringing the mobile app store model right onto the web, which could be huge news for app developers, publishers and others who have been looking to this model to generate revenue in addition to the traditional method of advertising support. The Chrome Web Store will reportedly be supported on all major platforms, including Windows, Mac and Linux as well as, of course, Chrome OS . Both free and paid apps will be available, as well as support for 40 languages in 70 countries. Google also notes that thanks to the standards support baked in to the store, apps written for the Chrome Web Store should additionally work on other modern web browsers. The Chrome Web Store will be available to end users later this year, with developer support ramping up now in order to ensure a well-stocked store at launch. Google has published preliminary documentation for developers to give them a sense of what will be required to prepare a web app for the store. The company promises further technical details as well as guided discussion sessions in the Chrome developer group are coming soon. What do you think about the app store model coming directly onto the web? image courtesy of iStockphoto , pagadesign For more technology coverage, follow Mashable Tech on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook Tags: app store , apps , chrome , chrome web store , Google , google io , Linux , mac , Windows
